Timor trough and Australia: Facies show topographic wave migrated 80 km during the past 3 m.y.

Correlation of seismic profiles with the Pliocene and Quaternary facies at DSDP Site 262 in the axis of the 3 km deep Timor Trough shows that Australia and the lateral facies sequence of the Timor Trough foredeep that defines a topographic wave have approached each other by 80 km during the past 3 m.y. The Timor Trough and the island of Timor have the form of a wave of amplitude 6 km and half-wavelength of 100 km; the implied uplifting of Timor as this wave and Australia approached each other is confirmed by the present elevation of autochthonous bathyal deposits on Timor. The time-transgressive depositional and deformational facies of the Timor Trough foredeep resemble those of deep-sea trenches, so that foredeeps and trenches cannot be discriminated by the surface processes that operate in them.